1.15.2012

TDU Classic: (some) teams reactions

1. The breack-away:Tiago Machado (RADIOSHACK NISSAN TREK), Nathan Haas
(Garmin-Barracuda), Jay McCarthy and Bernard Sulzberger (UNI SA),
Matteo Montaguti (Ag2R La Mondiale), Daniele Ratto (Liquigas), Marcus
Burghardt (BMC), William Bonnet (FDJ-BigMat) and Mirko Selvaggi
(Vacansoleil) – managed to stay in the front till 8 laps (of 1.7
kilometers) from the end. Machado continued his effort for a short
while, together with Selvaggi, Jérémy Roy (FDJ-BigMat) and Luca Paolini
(Katusha). But then it was time for the sprinters.

2. Bennatiskips the cahotic sprint: "Too dangerous for me. José emphasized also that it was better not to give it a try today.” “That’s correct” Team Director José Azevedo agrees “This
criterium is too short for Daniele. Bennati needs a hard and longer
race. If he sprints here and he finishes tenth, then it is not good for
his morale. With this in mind, I asked all our riders not to take risks
in this criterium with so many corners." 3. The Jens Voight Show: "The first third of the race
he pulled the peloton."

4. The real race starts on
Tuesday: "To win a criterium like this,
you make a real train, like Lotto-Belisol did today. We don’t have the
riders here to do that, but don’t worry, the real race starts on
Tuesday. We will show our new jerseys the coming week.”

Team Sky: http://www.teamsky.com/article/0,27290,17546_7433711,00.html

1. Yeates happy the train worked: “The plan was to come
together on the last lap and they did that perfectly. It’s not easy to
pull off wins every time though because many other teams had the same
ideas as us."

2. Just a dummy run for TDU: "without wanting
to disrespect the race, it won’t count for anything in terms of the
bigger picture.”

3. Looking ahead for best results: "We’ll sit down tonight and look things over and we’ll learn
from it moving forwards and hopefully next time there’ll be a different
result.”